David Coallier

David Coallier is a Canadian-born (Montréal) serial technology entrepreneur, engineer and angel investor now based in Cork, Ireland. He moved out on his own at 15 to study, attended McGill University (computer science / electrical engineering), and reportedly sold his first technology company at 16. Early in his career he worked as a contractor for various governments — including remote consultancy for the Dutch government while living in Brazil — and became a well-known contributor to PHP open-source projects, with a stated personal interest in evolutionary game theory.

In Ireland he co-founded echolibre with Eamon Leonard (winning an open-source award for API work), and in 2011 the pair, together with Helgi Þorbjörnsson, built Orchestra, a platform-as-a-service for PHP, which was acquired by Engine Yard in August 2011. At Engine Yard he served as Director of Engineering, leading teams across Dublin and San Francisco, before moving into a Security Data Scientist role — the experience that seeded his next venture.

In October 2014 he founded Barricade.io, a Cork-based cybersecurity startup that used machine learning as an "early warning system" against intrusions, aimed at SMEs. He raised roughly €1.2m in seed within weeks (and ~€1.6m in a later round) from angels and VCs; Barricade was acquired by Sophos in 2016. Since 2021 he has been co-founder and CEO of Clearword (with Daire Irwin and Clodagh Monks), an AI meeting-assistant company that turns conversations into summaries, action items and workflow automations. Clearword raised a $3.25m (€2.8m) seed round led by Connect Ventures.

Across these ventures Coallier built an angel portfolio, most notably as an early backer of Intercom and Trustev — two of Ireland's best-known tech success stories.

• Invests at seed / early stage, typically writing personal angel checks rather than fund capital.
• Founder-and-team-first investor. In his own words: *"If I don't see the passion in the founder and the team, I won't invest."* He adds, *"Without passion, you will struggle and ultimately fail."*
• Strong affinity for technical founders and software / SaaS, cybersecurity, developer tooling and AI — areas mirroring his own operating experience.
• Values founders who can "speak the language of investors" — i.e., understand how to communicate with and manage their backers.
• Highly selective; comfortable declining deals where values or partnership fit don't align.
• Openly champions founder mental health and resilience, comparing entrepreneurs to athletes who lack support systems — a signal he backs founders for the long, hard road, not just the idea.